The Stolen Singer | Page 2

observer; those who loved her would call her beautiful without stint. But more appealing than her beauty was the fine spirit--a strong, free spirit, loving honesty and courage--which glowed like a flame behind her beauty. Best of all, perhaps, was a touch of quaintness, a slightly comic twist to her lips, an imperceptible alertness of manner, which revealed to the initiated that she had a sense of humor in excellent running order.
It was evident that the little excursion was of the nature of a pilgrimage. The idle hour, the bit of holiday, became a memorial, as recollection brought back to her the days of childhood spent down yonder, a few squares away, in this very city. They seemed bright in retrospect, like the pleasant paths of a quiet garden, but they had ended abruptly, and had been followed by years of activity and colorful experience in another country. Through it all what anticipations had been lodged in her return to Home! Something there would complete the story--the story with its secret ecstasies and aspirations--the story of the ardent springs of youth.
Withdrawing her gaze from the scene below, though with apparent reluctance, she took from the pocket of her coat an opened envelope which she regarded a moment with thoughtfulness, before drawing forth the enclosures. There were two letters, one of which was brief and written in bad script on a single sheet of paper bearing a legal head. It was dated at Charlesport, Maine, and stated that the writer, in conformity with the last wish of his friend and client, Hercules Thayer, was ready to transfer certain deeds and papers to the late Mr. Thayer's designated heir, Agatha Redmond; also that the writer requested an interview at Miss Redmond's earliest convenience.
Holding the half-opened sheets in her hand, the lady closed her eyes and sat motionless, as if in the grasp of an absorbing thought. With the disappearing child, the signs of life on the hillside had diminished. The traffic of the street passed far below, the sharp click-click of a pedestrian now and then sounded above, but no one passed her way. The hum of the city made a blurred wash of sound, like the varying yet steady wash of the sea. As she opened her eyes again, she saw that the twilight had perceptibly deepened. Far away, lights began to flash out in the city, as if a million fireflies, by twos and threes and dozens, were waking to their nocturnal revelry.
On the hill the light was still good, and the lady turned again to her reading. The other letter was written on single sheets of thin paper in an old-fashioned, beautiful hand. Wherever a double-s occurred, the first was written long, in the style of sixty years ago; and the whole letter was as easily legible as print. Across the top was written: "To Agatha Redmond, daughter of my ward and dear friend, Agatha Shaw Redmond"; and below that, in the lawyer's choppy handwriting, was a date of nearly a year previous. As Agatha Redmond read the second letter, a smile, half of sadness, half of pleasure, overspread her countenance. It ran as follows:
"ILION, MAINE.
"MY DEAR AGATHA:
"I take my pen in hand to address you, the daughter of the dearest friend of my life, for the first time in the twenty-odd years of your existence. Once as a child you saw me, and you have doubtless heard my name from your mother's people from time to time; but I can scarcely hope that any knowledge of my private life has come to you. It will be easy, then, for you to pardon an old man for giving you, in this fashion, the confidence he has never been able to bestow in the flesh.
"When you read this epistle, my dear Agatha, I shall have stepped into that next mystery, which is Death. Indeed, the duty which I am now discharging serves as partial preparation for that very event. This duty is to make you heir to my house and estate and to certain accessory funds which will enable you to keep up the place.
"You may regard this act, possibly, as the idiosyncrasy of an unbalanced mind; it is certain that some of my kinsfolk will do so. But while I have been able to bear up under their greater or less displeasure for many years, I find myself shrinking before the possibility of dying absolutely unknown and forgotten by you. Your mother, Agatha Shaw, of blessed memory now for many years, was my ward and pupil after the death of your grandfather. I think I may say without undue self-congratulation that few women of their time have enjoyed as sound a scheme of education as your mother. She had a knowledge of mathematics, could construe both in Latin and